NCAAÂ® Football by EA SPORTS

NCAA football is back in action and college kids all over the country couldn’t be happier. Whether it’s tailgating, historic rivalries, fight songs, or the huge stadiums the wars are waged in, there’s a lot to be excited about. Sports gamers in particular get hyped, especially those who have allegiances to Top 25 schools. As a counter to the slower-paced Madden franchise, NCAA Football is a freer game that emphasizes big plays and huge scores. This is the first crack at the NCAA franchise on the iPhone, and we’ve got the scouting report on this debut.

As we mentioned, college ball is very different from the pro game. College programs run offensive and defensive schemes that range from conventional to gimmicky approaches. Because of the differences in talent from the average teams compared to the elite teams, we see big plays and bigger blowout scores.

Does NCAA Football capture these elements accurately? Well, it does, but in a cheap way. Teams don’t have specific play books for the most part. Instead, there’s global playbooks all teams use. So you’ll see run-heavy teams like Navy sporting all kinds of spread passing formations they’d never run in real life. Same applies for defense, and it does make the game feel generic in that sense.

It’s very real, but it’s also on your phone.

Gameplay follows the same blueprint executed by NCAA’s big brother, Madden. Onscreen buttons allow users to have a surprising amount of control. Action Control Time (ACT) slows the game down and opens up more advanced moves for the core gamers. Much of this functionality works just as well as Madden’s, so you’ll enjoy a fine playing game of football.

One mechanic that’s important to touch on is the implementation of the option play. While there are several permutations of the play, the common scenario is a run play initiated by the quarterback. Depending on the approach of the defensive ends, the quarterback can run the ball or pitch it back to a running back.

Some teams use this play at the crux of their entire offense, and it’s a college staple. NCAA Football automatically launches ACT to give you the ability to read the defense and react. We love this system, and running the option is very fun.

Play modes in NCAA Football are solid too. The standard options for quick games, season, and multiplayer are all in. Surprisingly, the “create your own school” tool is a great addition from the console versions of the game. You can’t make your school logo, but there’s a ton of customizable options, including the ability to use custom soundtracks for important moments in the game.

NCAA Flight Control.

Season mode is where you’ll spend the majority of your time, and it’s shocking how flawed it is. There aren’t any BCS or AP poll rankings, which are a very big deal. These rankings determine which schools play in certain bowl games, and the omission make bowl selections a complete mystery.

The simulation engine is broken as well. Teams like Alabama, Texas, and Boise State are national title contenders and each of them finished losing more games than they won in multiple simulations, which is absolutely ridiculous. Only the five BCS bowls made the cut too, so bowl season feels anti-climatic.

The pageantry and unique environments for all the teams are accurately represented in NCAA Football. Iconic fight songs and real-life stadiums are in the game, and the excitement level of the crowd shines. Completing big plays or scoring touchdowns fire up the bands, and the scripting is spot on.

We’re excited about college ball coming to the iPhone. Even with the numerous flaws and blemishes we referenced, this is good foundation to build on. Much like Madden used the first year to catch its bearings, we’re seeing the same here with NCAA Football. Assuming the team at EA retools the Season Mode, next year’s game could be a contender for Sports Game of the Year in 2011.

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The fine folks at Milkbag games have released Sidewords. A fun little diversion of a word game that is the devil child of crosswords and scrabble. For each level in the game the grid must be completed to win the level — this means that each letter at the top and side must be used. And not just the top or side, but each word must be made up of letters from the top and side to create a grid. It’s a pain, but in the right kind of way. Even the simplest of the levels can be a head scratcher until you get used to the game. Well worth the $3 as a diversion while we wait for Milkbag to finally release Snow Siege.

We’d like to thank our sponsor for this week, Zap Zap Kindergarten Math.

It’s not always easy to tear your kids away from their tablets and make them do something edifying. Thankfully, Zap Zap Kindergarten Math relieves you of this task by turning mathematics into a fun touchscreen video game. Win win!

Aimed at children 3-6 years old, the app makes math fun by ‘gamifying’ it, turning simple mathematics problems into little challenges so that your pre-schooler can learn and play at the same time.

There are more than two dozen mini-games, split across three categories: Numbers, Shapes and Measurements, and Add and Subtract. According to the developer the difficulty of these puzzles is adaptive too, so kids of any ability can be both encouraged and challenged.

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Pewter Games has brought their charming point and click adventure The Little Acre to iOS. It’s an amazingly beautiful animated adventure set in a sort of hybrid magical / alien world. A great all ages adventure and very fun.

We’d like to thank our sponsor for this week, The House of Da Vinci by Blue Brain Games. There’s a reason Leonardo Da Vinci is the only renaissance figure who routinely shows up in video games you know. With his remarkable inventiveness and genius for creative problem-solving, Da Vinci was a gamer through and through. He was just born 500 hundred years too soon. Thankfully, there are studios like Blue Brain Games to bring him to life in videogame form. The House of Da Vinci, which comes to us courtesy of a hugely successful Kickstarter campaign, is a puzzler that seeks to channel the artistry and innovation of its title character.

You play as one of Da Vinci’s more promising apprentices, and you have the challenging task of trying to work out where the hell he’s gone. Was he assassinated by the church? Who knows. Has he quietly gone into a retirement? Perhaps. Did he accidentally invent a shrink ray and shrink himself down to the size of an dustmite? Probably not. Da Vinci’s workshop looks beautiful, thanks to some impressive 3D graphics, and the in-game environment is crammed with all the elaborate machines and crazy inventions you’d expect to find in the workplace of a renaissance genius.(more…)

Poly Bridge is out now on iOS, and it’s good to have it! It’s a great game and many seem to agree that it’s the best bridge builder game available. But the iOS versions, so far, is missing the sandbox mode. I would hope that it’s coming soon in an update. If you are all interested in physics puzzlers, grab this one. (Note: the video is for the PC version, I have yet to see a trailer for the mobile version, the developer Dry Cactus isn’t that great at marketing…)

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